The term “electrical safety device” comprises devices which protect individuals against an electrical shock, e.g. a Residual Current Device (RCD) or a Residual Current Circuit Breaker (RCCB), devices which protect electrical circuits or electrical appliances from damage caused by overcurrent, e.g. circuit breakers (such as a MCB or a MCCB), as well as devices which provide both types of electrical safety, e.g. a Residual Current Breaker with Overcurrent protection (RCBO), as long as those devices are provided with a trip mechanism with an actuator lever.
In rail applications, there are breakers which protect safety functions such as emergency brake loop, default ground current monitoring, over speed loop, black record box, etc. These breakers are called signaling breakers. These breakers cannot mechanically be operated. Only electrical triggering is considered in these applications. It is only allowed to remote the breaker, i.e. resetting the breaker remotely without coming into physical contact with the breaker, in the event of a potential breaker triggering. For some critical safety functions, this remote is performed under specific process in such a way that a common agent or driver cannot remote the breaker. Only qualified upgraded personnel are allowed to do this after filling out procedural documents.
Until now only special breakers allowed the above functions. These breakers do not have any handle like regular circuit breakers. The remote of the breaker is done via a small key tooling. Such special breakers are relatively expensive.